The parents of a teenage boy who committed suicide after allegedly taking advice from ChatGPT are now suing artificial intelligence company OpenAI and Sam Altman, its CEO.
Adam Raine, 16, died on April 11, 2025, after ChatGPT fed into his suicidal ideation and gave him guidance on taking his own life, according to the lawsuit that was filed on Tuesday. Matt and Maria Raine claim that OpenAI prioritized releasing its latest version, GPT-4o, over safety measures to prevent psychological dependency that could have saved their son’s life. Altman himself has called that update “too sycophantic.”
“ChatGPT was functioning exactly as designed: to continually encourage and validate whatever Adam expressed, including his most harmful and self-destructive thoughts, in a way that felt deeply personal,” said the 39-page complaint, which HuffPost obtained.
“Every ideation he has or crazy thought, it supports, it justifies, it asks him to keep exploring it,” Matt Raine told The New York Times.
Adam Raine’s exchanges with ChatGPT were more than 3,000 pages long, with the chats occurring from Sept. 1, 2024, until his death on April 11, according to NBC News. His early conversations with the app were mainly for assistance with homework, but the tone soon changed, the lawsuit said.
